Richard Branson becomes proud owner of RichardBranson.xxx

Shop-owner turned mega-rich air balloon-riding tycoon, Richard Branson, has won a legal battle with an Australian who registered the richardbranson.xxx domain name.

When the .xxx top level domain became available in 2011, legions of cyber-squatters were taking to the web to buy up URLs which most businesses would probably not want associated with their names. Rights holders were able to block .xxx domains but that didn’t stop Sean Truman from getting there first.

Virgin boss Branson dragged Truman through the courts, to the National Arbitration Forum in the States, which decided he had bought richardbranson.xxx “in bad faith”. According to the Beeb, Truman claimed that he had only bought the domain because he admired Branson.

Despite Truman’s defences – that Branson frequently used a sex sells approach to promote his businesses – the NAF said richardbranson.xxx would, ultimately, embarrass Branson. The domain is now under Virgin’s control. What Branson intends to do with it is unimaginable.

Truman, though, will be relieved to hear that there are other options available, if he really must own a saucy Branson domain. TechEye is here to help. The following are all available from GoDaddy.com:

– RichardBransonBendingOverAlluringly.com is just £6.49– RichardBransonShortSkirt.net is a bargain at £6.49– DirtyLeatherBranson.com is cheap at £6.49 again– BondageBranson.Me is a steal at £5.09– RichardBransonServicesVirgin.TV is £24.79– CoquettishBranson.xxx is a fair bit more expensive at £62.99 / year– BransonOnHisBack.Jobs was by far the priciest domain running up £86.80 for the first year.